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Bridge

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There is always an element of mystery surrounding the Worldwide Pairs, which was played in June for the 11th time, with Alcatel, an international telecommunications corporation based in France, as sponsor. The World Bridge Federation names Omar Sharif as master of ceremonies and Eric Kokish as analyst, but never offers any explanation of how the deals are selected or scored.

Only a handful of people around the world have the bridge expertise and writing skill to do the analysis for this event. One is Barry Rigal, who recently migrated from London to Manhattan. He took part in the Alcatel, which he could not have done were he the analyst, and on the diagramed deal, as South, landed in three no-trump after aggressively raising his partner's two-club rebid to three clubs.

He won the spade lead with the queen and led the diamond eight. When East played low he did likewise from the dummy, a deep finesse which is the right percentage play in these situations. He played his remaining diamond, winning with the jack when West played the ten.

There was no hurry for clubs, so he played a third diamond and when West won he continued spades. A fourth diamond and a third spade left the lead in dummy in this position:

NORTH

--

7

K

K J 8 7

WEST

9

A 10 9

--

10 3

EAST

--

K 8 5

--

Q 6 5

SOUTH

--

Q J 4

--

A 9 4

On the last diamond East threw a heart, a suit on which he had already played high-low. South and West also threw hearts, and Rigal had a decision to make. West had shown most of the high-card strength, and East had been reluctant to part with a club, so South placed the club queen on his right. He led dummy's jack for a backward finesse and was rewarded. He made an overtrick and a score of 90 out of 100 points.